Eleventh International Conference on The Inclusive Museum

Abstract

Museums throughout history have proven to be one of the cornerstones of the educational process and a reflection of a country’s history, culture, and society. However, some museums have become a burden on government budgets, accused of targeting certain classes of society, and sometimes becoming a means of tax evasion. Additionally, in some places the role of museums in society and the influence of museums on the political process is weak or almost non-existent. On the other hand, governance has been considered one of the main tools toward comprehensive and sustainable development. Supporting accountability and transparency, fighting corruption, enhancing public participation and inclusion, among other factors, are the main themes of the governance process. Thus, we propose that applying good governance practices to museums will result in supporting the role of museums in society through public participation and bringing back public trust to museums as an important institution in the educational, cultural, and political process. Also, adopting good governance practices by museums will give legitimacy to the museums institutions’ work, as well as enhancing museums to be less dependent on government funds and self-sufficient financially. The research focuses on museums in Saudi Arabia because Saudi Arabia is new to the museum world. The recent government plans tend to focus on building new museums and developing the mechanism for community participation in the political process. Analytical descriptive research method, by reviewing previous studies and analyzing government’s and museums’ documents, is utilized in order to reach the objectives of the study.